USC tackles homelessness in LA and on campus

California’s homelessness problem is receiving federal attention. Two weeks ago, President Donald Trump sent multiple administrative officials to Los Angeles  to assess the city’s homelessness crisis and earlier this week, L.A. City Councilman Joe Busciana asked Gov. Gavin Newsom to declare a state of emergency on homelessness. 

While federal and local leaders have been debating solutions and devising policy recommendations, USC’s own Homelessness Initiative has been actively working to address the issue in the surrounding university community. 

The USC Initiative to End Homelessness launched in spring 2016 as part of Provost Michael Quick’s university-wide plan to tackle “wicked problems,” or challenges in the 21st century. 

Brenda Wiewel, director of the initiative, was appointed by Quick at the initiative’s launch. The program aims to develop a way in which USC could contribute to the government, non-profit and business worlds in order to eliminate homelessness at a local level.  

Wiewel, who works with a steering committee comprising 12 USC deans, believes that federal attention on the issue will be beneficial, even though the differing perspectives voiced from the White House might fail to address homelessness in a constructive way. 

“I felt like the focus that [the president] wanted to do was to criminalize the people who are homeless, and in essence get the police involved,” Wiewel said. “What they end up doing is just filling the jails with people who are homeless, and it isn’t effective.”

In early June, L.A. city officials reported that homelessness in the county, which counts the number of people living on the streets, in vehicles and in shelters, increased by 12%. The same report found that within the city, the number of homeless individuals increased to more than 36,000, a 16% increase from 2018.

While this number increased in the past year, Wiewel said she hopes to ensure that the University remains a source of problem solving during this crisis. She said that at first, the initiative faced challenges regarding the services the University would be able to provide. However, she emphasized the importance of a united community and interdisciplinary collaboration to find solutions to homelessness. 

Over the past academic year, the initiative had over 1,500 student volunteers, who completed over 132,000 hours of service. This year, the initiative is also encouraging students to work on the research team, led by the Dworak-Peck School of Social Work, starting in December as part of its annual effort with the L.A. homelessness count. 

“USC began to look at [the issue] and say maybe we can help,”  Wiewel said. “We have a lot of resources here, how can we use our resources, how can we partner, collaborate, come together and be a part of the solution because [the USC community] is not an island … we have some responsibility to help.”

Alec Vandenberg, a senior majoring in public policy, has been actively engaged in tackling the issue of homelessness at the University, focusing primarily on USC students who face food insecurity. While Vandenberg believes that homelessness in the city is a dire issue that needs to be addressed, he said Trump has yet to take action on the issue.

“A lot of people agree that there’s a housing shortage, there’s a housing affordability issue and all that ties in together, and there’s got to be a lot of tools in the toolbox to deal with that,” Vandenberg said. “But if the federal government is serious about tackling homelessness and housing security, we know the resources it’s going to take, we know what policies and programs work. It’s ultimately putting the money where your mouth is.”

This year, Wiewel hopes to develop more meaningful relationships with the L.A. community. She also hopes that the leadership of Carol Folt as USC president will help expand the initiative’s efforts. 

“The deans are still in place, and they still care, and each of the schools are doing interesting things,” Wiewel said. “But, I have a feeling that because [Folt] really wants to see [USC] be a partner in the community and contribute, this is such a perfect opportunity because we have already established a foundation for it, and we have a lot of expertise and a lot of interest from students.”

Max Prosser, a sophomore majoring in dance, said while he has heard of the initiative, he believes that increased engagement on campus would encourage students to become more involved.

“I don’t know a whole lot about it … but I feel like [the issue of homelessness] is important, and we need to do more about it,” Prosser said. “I should be better, and I feel like I should get more involved with it.”

Wiewel said the ultimate goal is to make sure that each student is fully aware of the issue and can find some way to address it, no matter what field they are studying. 

“The vision is that anyone that graduates from USC should have an educated view on why there is homelessness, who people are that are homeless,” Wiewel said. “They shouldn’t be the ones frightened or stigmatizing or stereotyping, we would want them to understand the complexities, to have compassion, and to find some way to make a contribution.”

The Initiative has partnered with many resources such as the Trojan Food Pantry, located at Parkside Apartments. The pantry, which was established in 2018, was created to address the needs of students who might be facing homelessness and food insecurity. 

Along with creating on campus resources, the initiative has been successful in launching outreach programs. A new program with the Keck School of Medicine and the Los Angeles County Hospital was developed to address the medical needs of homeless people. The program, called the Street Medicine Institute, trains health care providers in treating those on the streets and develops a way of helping homeless individuals who were admitted into hospitals.

Wiewel emphasized the importance of active engagement from the USC community, whether they are educated on the issue or not. She said community members across the University can help in the initiative’s efforts.

“We need a group of people who are at a place where they can really understand [the issue] at a much more sophisticated level,” Wiewel said. “To be able to actually use their knowledge and intelligence to help solve it.”

The initiative has also encouraged students to engage in problem solving in the classroom, partnering with the School of Architecture to challenge students to create affordable and implementable housing projects. 

The initiative plans to host many events this year, beginning with a homelessness awareness week in November. The committee planning the event meets every Monday, and Vandenberg said that more engagement and conversation about the issue among students will allow more people to access resources.

“The more people are talking about the issue really helps in terms of decreasing stigma and proliferating resources and breaking down this barrier so that more people can access the resources,” Vandenberg said. “Homelessness and hunger are real on every college campus, especially [at USC], despite the inceptions of what students go here.”